Performances

Tune of the Day: Marche Funèbre d'une Marionette

by Charles Gounod

The television program Alfred Hitchcock Presents (and its sequel, The Alfred Hitchcock Hour) introduced viewers to Charles Gounod’s little “Funeral March for a Marionette”, although most were none the wiser that they were hearing honest-to-goodness classical music. Gounod composed it in 1872 for an unfinished Suite Burlesque, apparently with tongue in cheek: killed in a duel, a marionette is being taken to his final resting place, but members of the funeral procession apparently cannot resist stopping off at a nearby tavern to take the edge off their grief!